Cronix

by James Hider

  Nothing had come out. His mouth was dry as a leaf, and he only had three quarters left, not enough for another can. He pressed the button to return his change, but nothing happened. “Shit.” He kicked the machine, then knelt down and put his hand under the metal flap. Groping around, he couldn’t feel any blockage, but couldn't locate the missing drink either. He pushed his hand up and felt the rollers that were meant to dispense the cans. Maybe if he prodded them…

  "Oh shit." Panic as his fingers jam between the rollers. He gave a reflexive tug and felt like he had dislocated a knuckle.

  "Mooooootherfuuuucker," he howled. The word drifted across the prairie, unheard by sentient others.

  Tears in his eyes, Glenn tried to lift the metal flap with his free right hand. The angle made it almost impossible to gain any purchase. He had to twist his whole body in the narrow space between him and the unyielding machine. He sobbed in pain and rage at the absurdity of such a device.

  He stopped tugging. Maybe he had an extra twenty five cents somewhere in his pockets. A dollar would buy his liberty. He groped his pocket with his right hand and pulled out the three quarters. He twisted his hip to access his left-side pocket. The two dimes, a tissue crusted with snot and a five dollar bill were all he found. The machine did not take bills. He was a nickel short.

  His whining started anew. He tugged again, but pain bolted through his crushed fingers. He slammed his right hand against the machine, then lunged at it with his whole body in a furious, futile attempt to overturn it. Nothing gave.

  He dropped to his knees and sobbed, his head slumped against the cold machine. His fevered mind was already envisioning the next day's headlines, in which his slow and painful death was reduced to a bizarre tale guaranteed to raise a laugh of incredulity or horror among early morning commuters.

  “Man freezes to death after fingers caught in Kansas vending machine." His epitaph would boil down to just that.

  The image lent urgency to the tugs he inflicted on his hand, transformed him into an animal overflowing with Instinct Number One: self-preservation, ready to chew off its own paw.

  Glenn heard the metacarpal crack of cartilage parting company with bone, a bullet of pain shooting up his arm. His voice broke strangled in the night and he came to rest on his knees, sobbing and wild-eyed. It was just a few yards to warmth and safety of his car: a scant nine hours till the clerk turned up. But in these temperatures he might have well have been an explorer high in the Arctic Circle, a thousand leagues from nowhere.

  The snow was falling in a thick kaleidoscope now. The night looked like a television screen of his life, crawling with static as transmission shut down. He prayed out loud for a car to pass by, for some sensible motorist to see his headlights.

  He drew himself up into a ball in the snow. His brain tried to shut out what was happening. Around him, the world showed every sign of going on without him.

  He sobbed to himself, "Mum, please help me, please Mum. Please. God, oh god." For an oddly detached moment he wondered about the mechanics of the end: would his life just slip out of him, a stranger leaving quietly by the backdoor? Would he notice anything at the last instant? All those years, the thoughts and longings, compressed into a modest exit into the dark. The thought seemed bland but softly attractive now, a fresh idea he had never toyed with before. Just go.

  Sniveling and wrapped in his own thoughts, he didn't register the approach of the four-by-four as it scrunched across the snow, headlights mingling with those of his own car. It was only the beeping of an alarm, telling the driver that a door was open while the headlights were still on, that slowly brought Glenn back to the world that he was still a part of.

  He looked up, but was blinded by the glare. A woman's caustic laugh came out of the fountain of light.

  "Boy, what the hell happened to you?"

  He twisted his stiff neck to the sound of her voice. The presence of another human, the return of life, pushed the sniveling child back to its rightful place. His socially interactive autopilot hesitantly re-asserted itself.

  "I... I got my hand caught. In the drinks machine." He sniffed at the absurdity of it all, realizing he had jumped the narrow but bottomless chasm between disaster and farce. "Didn't have enough change to get the bloody thing to open again. Thought I was gonna to freeze to death."

  She laughed. "That'd be a fucked-up way to go."

  “Yeah, I know,” he said, slobber-laughing with her. "Have you got a nickel?"

  “A nickel?”

  "Yeah, this fucked-up machine opens for a dollar in change. I got three quarters and two dimes, just need another five cents to get it to open." His voice sounded like a bad actor faking a head-cold, his frozen lips barely moving.

  "Is that all it takes to get you out of there?" In the halo of light he made out movement as she rummaged her pocket for change.

  He couldn't see her face, but he could make out a hood around her head. "Wait a minute, I'll check in the car."

  She disappeared inside her vehicle. As he waited, he once again felt the biting cold that he had forgotten even as he gave in to it. He knew he'd lost all sense of time, lost his capacity to do anything but stumble into the arms of any willing savior, but she did seem to be taking an inordinately long time looking for the change.

  The headlights of her car went out. He heard her footsteps in the snow, brisk and businesslike. Then the headlights of his own car also died. Abruptly, everything was dark.

  She scrunched back over the snow to where he was squatting like a leashed dog outside a supermarket.

  "You're damn lucky I came by," she said. "Nobody else drives the road this late at night, specially not in this weather. Jesus."

  "I know," he said, squinting to try to make out her face, his retinas flooded with the vanished radiance of headlights. "I think you saved my life."

  "Saved your life for five cents," she said, laughing low again. "How about that? Man, you can't even get a candy bar for that."

  "I know," he said. "Listen, I'm so cold. Could you give me the nickel please?"

  "I don't know what you could buy for a nickel," she went on, oblivious to his plea. "Not even a stick of gum, even if they sold it individually. Apart from that, I guess penny chews would be the only things you could still get these days for five cents."

  "Please, can you hurry up and get me out of here. I think I've broken my fingers and I can't feel my hand. I think I might have frostbite. I’m not even sure the machine will release me once I put the money in. Might have to call the fire department to cut me out."

  "And your life, of course," she went on, ignoring what he had just said. She had an eastern accent, enunciated her words clearly. "Your life right now has the value of a penny chew, I guess, in strictly market terms." She held out her hand and touched his cheek. He flinched away at the unexpected contact, but his chilled flesh instantly missed the soft warmth of her palm.

  "You know, the Chinese say that if you save a life, you're responsible for it all of your own life." She let out a soft whistle. "Which would mean if you went out and killed someone, I'd be responsible."

  Glenn listened, confused and increasingly angry.

  "I don't care about the Chinese. I'm not going to kill anyone. I was just driving out west, heading for California."

  “You know, I don't really give a shit about what the Chinese say either." She laughed. "But, before I invest my nickel in your chances of living a full and healthy life, there's a little favor I need to ask of you."

  "Yeah, whatever. Please, just give me..."

  "You see, my brother is in serious trouble. Dire need, just like yourself. And I think you might be just the person I need to help save him."

  "What? How can I save him? What's wrong with him?" The words were a barely coherent slur by now. Some last flicker of consciousness rebelled against the injustice of setting conditions on the threshold of such a simple act of salvation.

  "Just take it from me, he's in trouble. Mortal danger. And if you help
me, just for six months, I think we can save him."

  "Six months?"

  "I'm not asking for you to do anything dangerous or heroic or anything like that. Or illegal, don’t worry. Just come and live with me up on my farm for six months, board and lodging provided. I'll even pay you for your time, don't worry. Pay you extremely well, in fact, even though I would be saving your life. More money than you could dream of, probably."

  Even in his befuddled state, the use of the conditional tense set an alarm bell ringing in his head.

  "But ... I've got things to do. I've got... I've got a life to go back to." He wasn't sure exactly what life that was: shifting tectonic plates of vague possibility colliding in an unformed future, throwing out tiny islands of reality upon which he hopped his random course.

  "Not without my nickel you don't," said the woman. "What's your name?"

  "Glenn."

  The name seemed to make her pause for a moment, like it had disturbed a train of thought. She turned it over once in her mouth, then collected herself again.

  "Glenn. And tell me… how old are you, Glenn?"

  "Twenty-nine."

  "Twenty-nine, huh?" She reached in her pocket and pulled out a small knife, its wooden handle no longer than her palm. She hooked a thumbnail into the groove of the blade and unsheathed it, then put it in the snow in front of him. He stared at it.

  "Well, I'd say that being a well-fed young Englishman with good schooling, a free medical health service and a reasonable diet you should be looking at a life expectancy of say, 72 years, the onset of mad cow disease or a grouse shooting accident notwithstanding. And providing, of course, that you can pluck up the balls to cut your fingers off of that vending machine and drive the 70 miles in a blizzard to Holsten City hospital without bleeding or freezing to death. Now, out of the statistically probable 43 years remaining to you if I save your life with my nickel, I'm sure you could see your way clear to sparing me six measly little months. A hundred and eighty days."

  Glenn stared at the blade. The possibility of picking it up and robbing her of her nickel flashed through his congealed mind. But chances were she'd be too quick, would just up and leave him here to freeze to death. The alternative was to cut his own fingers off. Even in his half-frozen state, the idea made him queasy.

  "What the fuck … This is too fucking weird."

  "Hey Glenn," she said softly, taking hold of his chin between her warm thumb and forefinger and lifting his face to hers, still hidden in the depths of her hood. "This is America, home of weird shit. But listen, this is just for starters. Come with me and I'll show you real weird. I'll show you never-been-seen-before weird shit. God-come down-from-the-mountaintop weird. I mean it. You'll see things you never even dreamed were possible. Magic, Glenn. Just promise you'll stay with me for six months."

  Even though he couldn’t make out her face in her muffled hood, there was something imploring as much as threatening in her voice.

  "This isn't happening to me," murmured Glenn. He could just make out the contours of her face in the dark. "What would I have to do?" he mumbled.

  "Be my mortician's mute. My Igor.” She laughed, a strangely indulgent sound in the cold night.

  "What the hell are you talking about?"

  "Can't say any more right now. National security issues. You can only know by giving me your solemn promise. And of course that's also the only way you'll get your sorry English ass outta here."

  She peered at him, and he could almost make out her face now, square jawed with a high forehead. He couldn't see her eyes, lost in the shadow of the hood, but he knew she was staring straight at him. The curve of her cheeks, visible in the dark, suggested she might be smiling.

  "What? I can't ... please, just let me go," he whispered.

  "I'll be in the car," she said, standing up.

  "Wait," he croaked. "You can't just leave me here to fucking freeze. I'll die here, you crazy bitch."

  "Not if you agree to my terms," she called back, barely turning her head.

  He saw her get back in the car, heard the door click. His brain was too numb to process what had just happened. In the dark, he couldn't see her sitting at the wheel, but presumed she was watching him in his agony.

  A while passed: nothing moved.

  Glenn forced himself to think, an almost physical labor for his weary, pain-racked mind. Six months. He was on the run, had nothing to go back to. But six months of what? This woman was clearly insane, probably homicidal, if she just could calmly sit in her car and watch a helpless man die slowly in front of her. But he had no choice: promise her anything, then high-tail it as soon as she released his crushed fingers from this ridiculous machine.

  "Okay," he hollered. "You win. I promise."

  There was no movement. He summoned his failing voice again.

  "I said, I promise to stay with you. Six months. Can you get me out of here now, please?"

  Still nothing. The snow had covered her windscreen. Oh Christ, what sick game is this? All her conditions and fucked-up shit were just to toy with him. She was going to let him die anyway. Maybe her brother needed an organ transplant, and he was the intended donor.

  "You fucking psycho bitch! Let me out of here, you crazy cunt," he screamed, fear and rage lifting his voice.

  The door opened and she got out, walked swiftly over and leaned right into him. He recoiled, in anticipation of a blow.

  "Shut the fuck up," she rasped. She pulled a handgun from her pocket, held it level with his face. Glenn half-screamed, twisted in terror away from the barrel.

  "Listen, there's a car coming," she said, her voice even but strained.

  She was staring into the darkness, back along the road he'd traveled on. He couldn't see or hear anything in the darkness and the snow.

  "Now listen to me, Glenn. I'm going to move my pick-up, just in case this person for any reason decides to pull in here. If he stops, then I guess you're off the hook. But you listen to me -- if you say anything about what happened here tonight, anything, you are condemning my brother to death. You understand me? You'll be killing him as surely as if you put this gun to his head and pulled the trigger. And I can't let anyone do that to my kid brother. I risked too much already and I love him too much. You breathe a word to anyone about this and you're dead. And I can have you killed, just like that. Do I make myself clear?"

  "Where's the car?" said Glenn, struggling to take in her words. She lifted the gun to his head.

  "Did you understand anything I just said to you?"

  "Yeah," he mumbled, head spinning, whether from the cold or the shocking anticipation of a bullet he couldn't tell.

  "What did I say?"

  "You said ... you'd kill me if I told anyone."

  "Good. Now bear that in mind if you wake up in Holsten General tomorrow morning."

  She slipped the gun back into her coat pocket hurried to her car. She didn't turn her lights on but he heard the engine kick into life. She slowly trundled across the loose snow, out of sight behind the gas station, somewhere across the frozen prairie. The night swallowed her in seconds.

  Glenn felt huge hot tears building up under his eyes, and he was blubbering like a baby as a fresh set of headlights cut across the forecourt from the main road and bathed him in their cold light.

  ***

  The professors busied themselves round the coffee pot, chatting as they poured milk and clattered spoons. Porter guffawed at one of his own jokes and Swaincroft loiteried to one side, by the door, avoiding the attention of his distinguished colleagues. Oriente skirted the group and snuck up behind the doctoral student.

  “Could I have a word please?”

  Swaincroft swiveled around, almost spilling his coffee.

  “With me? Why, sure. Of course…” he said, noting the curious, semi-resentful stares from the older academics.

  Oriente noted the attention too. “Maybe we could step outside for a minute?”

  “Sure, sure. Whatever suits you, Mr Oriente,” th
e young man replied, already fumbling the door handle.

  Outside, Oriente smiled awkwardly.

  “I’ve been wanting to meet you, Quintus. Lola has been a very good friend to me these past few weeks. In fact, my only friend here, and she speaks very highly of you.”

  Swaincroft shuffled uneasily, slurped his coffee to cover his fading smile. “Yes, she’s great, isn’t she? Absolute diamond. I was lucky to run into her.” He paused, then added. “And please, call me Quin. Nobody calls me Quintus, except my mother.”

  “Okay, Quin it is.” Oriente took the young man in with a frank stare: late twenties, slightly built, little on the short side. By the standards of the indigenous population, he was a good-looking man, clean cut and with a direct, confident gaze. What he lacked in the stunning beauty of the Eternals, he made up for in the fresh, original play of his features. Clearly he was embarrassed at this unexpected foray into his private life by a man he knew almost nothing about, and who was supposed the object of his study.

  Oriente coughed into his hand, nodded. “She seems very much in love with you. You’re a lucky man.”

  A feeble smile. Swaincroft clearly wished they could return to the safe subject of history.

  “Which is why I wanted to meet you, obviously. Any friend of Lola’s is a friend of mine,” he said and patted the younger man on the shoulder. “And of course, I guessed this whole piece of theatre could be …well, interesting to you.”

  “Oh god yes, you wouldn’t believe how fascinating this is,” babbled Swaincroft, relieved to be in neutral territory. Behind them, the door to the lecture room swung open. Poincaffrey headed to the bathroom with a curious glance.

  “Maybe I shouldn’t be getting involved in this,” Oriente said. “So tell me to back off if I get too…personal. But you know, Lola’s a beautiful, funny and actually very smart woman. But she’s worried you might not be…” he searched for the right word. “Really interested? Just thought I’d ask, as a friend, if there’s anything I can help out with. If there’s anything you…you know, wanted to talk about. In confidence, obviously.”